Terry Devane

Presiding over a highly charged trial of a priest accused of sexually assaulting numerous children, Judge Barbara Quincy finds her job complicated by the disappearance of her young lover, and enlists Sheldon Gold and Mairead O'Clare to help.

Disillusioned with her first foray into corporate law, Mairead O'Clare leaves a high-powered Boston firm to join ranks with Sheldon Gold, a down-at-the-heels criminal attorney. Mairead barely knows how to find the courthouse, let alone how to navigate the treacherous waters of a criminal trial. And immediately she finds herself thrust in the middle of a capital murder case, when she is assigned to represent Alpha, a homeless man and self-proclaimed hermit charged with the murder of another homeless man on the banks of the Charles River." "Mairead's first job is to win Alpha's trust so he will participate in his own defense. As the investigation proceeds and the questions of guilt and innocence become murkier and murkier, she learns just how elusive the search for justice can be.

After successfully completing the defense of Big Ben Friedman on a murder charge, Mairead O'Clare responds to a mysterious phone call and finds that Conchita Balaguer--juror number eleven--has been murdered, and Big Ben is the prime suspect.